The present invention relates to a flying ball stopping net device for ball games, which, when a ball game, such as baseball in the field, is played or practiced, is used to prevent a flying ball from flying farther than is necessary or accidentally flying toward a player.
As for the aforesaid flying ball stopping net device for ball games, there has been one disclosed in Japanese Patent laid open Publication NO. 9-266969.
According to the above publication, the flying ball stopping net device for ball games comprises a plurality of legs arranged side by side on the ground and respectively extending in one direction that is substantially horizontal, a frame body extending above said legs and substantially orthogonally to said one direction and along a substantially vertically extending imaginary plane, supports for supporting the lower portion of said frame body at longitudinally intermediate portions of said legs, and a flying ball stopping net closing the space surrounded with the outer edge of said frame body and attached to the latter. The legs and supports enable said frame body together with the flying ball stopping net to stand by itself on the ground and in this case said net device is in the xe2x80x9cusable state.xe2x80x9d
Said supports are clamps, and clamping and unclamping operations applied to said clamps make the frame body removably mountable on said legs.
In this connection, in the prior art described above, since the ends of the legs project from the frame body in said one direction, the outer shape of said net device is large as a whole. As a result, when said net device is passed through a narrow place, such as the doorway of a gymnasium, in moving it from its xe2x80x9cusable statexe2x80x9d for the purpose of, for example, storage, there is the danger of the ends of said legs interfering with passage.
Thus, during said operation of moving the net device, the practice has been to apply an unclamping operation to said clamps, to separate said legs and the frame body from each other, to disassemble said net device, and to bundle the parts, thereby reducing the outer shape of the net device to establish the xe2x80x9cdisassembled state.xe2x80x9d
On the other hand, when it is desired to bring said net device form the xe2x80x9cdisassembled statexe2x80x9d into the xe2x80x9cusable state,xe2x80x9d the practice has been to apply a claming operation to said clamps to thereby fix the frame body to said legs.
However, since the unclamping operation and the clamping operation applied to said clamps are troublesome, the operation of bringing the net device from either the xe2x80x9cdisassembled statexe2x80x9d or the xe2x80x9cusable statexe2x80x9d into the other state is very troublesome. Further, the operation of moving the net device to a desired position as by passing it through a narrow place is very troublesome.
An object of the present invention is to facilitate the operation of bringing the net device from either the xe2x80x9cdisassembled statexe2x80x9d or the xe2x80x9cusable statexe2x80x9d into the other state.
Another object of the invention is to facilitate the operation of moving the net device to a desired position as by passing it through a narrow place.
The present invention provides a flying ball stopping net device for ball games, including a plurality of legs arranged side by side on the ground and respectively extending in one direction that is substantially horizontal, a frame body extending above said legs and substantially orthogonally to said one direction and along a substantially vertically extending imaginary plane, supports for supporting the lower portions of said frame body at longitudinally intermediate portions of said legs, and a flying ball stopping net closing the space surrounded with the outer edge of said frame body and attached to said frame body,
said flying ball stopping net device for ball games being such that each support comprises a first support pipe projecting upward from the longitudinal intermediate portion of the leg, a second support pipe projecting downward from the lower portion of the frame body and removably fitted to said first support pipe for relative turning movement around the axis thereof, and an elastic locking body having one end fitted in one of the two support pipes and locked therein and the other end removably fitted in the other support pipe to be pressed against the inner peripheral surface thereof, and in that
the inner peripheral surface of the other support pipe and the other end of said locking body pressed against said inner peripheral surface are relatively slidable around the axis of the other support pipe.
Other objects, arrangements, functions and effects than those described above will become more apparent from a detailed description of the invention to be given below with reference to the attached drawings.